


All I Need Is A Hand To Hold

by robinlikeitshot



Category: Batman - All Media Types, DCU, Impulse (Comics), Red Robin (Comics), Superboy (Comics)
Genre: Angst, Fluff, M/M, Multi, Nightmares, Referenced past character death, Unedited we die like kon and bart, soft boyfriends, timkonbart secret santa!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-01
Updated: 2021-02-01
Packaged: 2021-03-12 01:34:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,680
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29127285
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/robinlikeitshot/pseuds/robinlikeitshot
Summary: Tim has nightmares. When he starts losing people, those nightmares get worse. But people come back, and they’re here to comfort him when he needs it.
Relationships: Bart Allen/Kon-El | Conner Kent, Bart Allen/Tim Drake, Bart Allen/Tim Drake/Kon-El, Tim Drake/Kon-El | Conner Kent
Comments: 3
Kudos: 60





	All I Need Is A Hand To Hold

**Author's Note:**

  * For [TheFairMaidenofFandom](https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheFairMaidenofFandom/gifts).



> @TheFairMaidenofFandom, hi I’m your secret Santa!! Uh sorry for the insane procrastination I did in getting this out, but even thought it’s like a month late, I really hope you like it!  
> I went with your prompt of one of them having nightmares and the other two comforting him. Enjoy!!

Tim is four years old, and he just had a nightmare. It was the same one that had been making him wake up shuddering and crying for the past two weeks—that is, two acrobats falling from their perches, wings broken, the boy who had hugged him and taken a picture with him screaming, covered in blood, while all Tim could do was _stand_ there.

In this instance, Tim can’t move when he wakes up either, not able to get his own limbs to cooperate even with his mind alert. It’s the worst type of nightmare, and one that Tim has gotten used to enough that he doesn’t make a single sound as tears silently stream down into his hair. Once the paralysis passes, Tim pushes himself off of his soft bed, the dark corners of his big room too daunting to stay any longer, and pads down the carpeted hallway to the sweeping double doors of his parents’ room.

He stands there for an extra two minutes, chewing his lip and fidgeting with the handle, till finally he squeezes his eyes shut and knocks on the door. For a few seconds, it seems that no one’s going to answer, so he knocks again. The muffled reply from behind the door allows the tight knot in his stomach to ease a little bit, and he quickly opens the door, closing it securely again behind him when he’s finally escaped the view of the shadowy limbs from the hallway window.

Running just as fast to the large bed at the end of the room, Tim nervously taps his Mom’s shoulder. He sees her shift slightly in the dark, before she sits up, reaching out towards him. He quickly crawls into her arms, burying his wet face into her shoulder as she shooshes him. “What’s wrong, baby,” she murmurs, voice still rough from sleep.

Tim sniffs, shaking his head. “Nightmare.”

She sighs, and he can feel the tired sigh tickle the top of his head where she’s resting her forehead. For a second, guilt rips through him, for waking her up for the fourth time that week, but the warm embrace distracts him from the bad feelings. “Do you think you can go back to sleep now?” she asks, voice still so hushed so she doesn’t wake Dad up, who’s giving occasionally loud snores into his pillow. It doesn’t make Tim want to laugh like it usually does, though.

He shakes his head, leaning back to look at her with pleading eyes. “C-could I stay here with you, just for tonight?”

She sighs again, pulling him further up the bed. He takes the hint and quickly crawls into the space in the middle of the bed, nestled between his parents. His mom lies back down, and Tim curls up around her when she doesn’t protest.

“Good night, Mom,” he whispers.

She doesn’t reply, already asleep. Tim decides to follow her example, and lets the comforting presence around him lull him to sleep.

***

  
Tim wakes up with his dad’s name on his lips and the memory of a bloody boomerang etched into his mind. The room around him is familiar, familiar because of nights where he couldn’t physically make it home because of either an exhausting training session or a throwdown with a Rouge during patrol.

Alfred keeps it neat and tidy, but Tim feels that the jagged shadows along the wall are even bigger than the ones back home, where every jacket thrown on the floor would create a monster straight from his very worst fears. Still, he’s Robin, he’s _Robin_ , he’s faced all his fears and still come out on top, and a stupid, stupid nightmare about his dad isn’t going to be what does him in.

But then why can’t he move? Why is there still sweat pooling at his brows, his sheets both excruciatingly hot and cold at the same time— Tim is scared. There’s bile crawling up the back of his throat, he’s shaking, fuck he’s, he’s _scared_.

For a second he imagines what he would have done a scant six, seven years ago; crawling out of his bed and into his mother’s arms to seek refuge from the dark seemed like such a lifetime ago. A lifetime filled with enough demons to turn that darkness into an endless abyss.

What Tim would give to get up and knock on the big double doors at the end of the hallway—he would never, of course, the boundary one he fears Bruce will hate him for if he crosses, oh but he _wants_ to. Wants to curl up close with Alfred’s hot chocolate and quietly talk about his day with the man, wants to call Dick or Barbara and pretend to talk about nothing at all, but he can’t, he can’t because he can’t move from his curled up stance on his rumpled bed, eyes locked on his unlocked door.

  
Tim forces them shut, pulls the too warm blankets over his shaking legs again, and, remembering Bruce’s training techniques, wills himself to sleep.

***

Tim wakes up this time to the sound of glass crashing, and immediately regrets opening his eyes when he sees the battalion of ninja.

Still, training kicks in, and he flips out of the bed, the bo under his pillow gripped in his hands, already extended. The ninjas don’t give him the time to orient himself, but he’s ready. He has to be, always, these days when he’s alone, with no backup, no safety-net—

And one goes down, a sharp, precise jab to their neck causing them to pass out. There’s still two more left, though, and they eye him up more warily this time. Tim quirks a tired smirk, glad that he’d been smart enough to predict this, to wear a mask to bed despite how uncomfortable it had been at first.

“C’mon now, I don’t think your boss would be too happy if you ran tail and ran, right? Thanks for the warm-up, by the way, really shakes off the morning feeling,” he snarks, baiting, while he slowly gets them to turn, edging them around in a circle, till finally, finally, his back is to the shattered window, and the two black clad figures are straight in front of him.

When they rush him this time, he doesn’t go up to meet them. Not even bothering with the quick sardonic salute he probably would have given if he was feeling any less tired, Tim twists and throws himself out the window, careful to avoid the jagged glass. The grapple tucked into his sleep pants is already in hand, and the next thing he knows is the feeling of weightlessness being tugged out underneath him.

So much for getting two hours of sleep that night, he didn’t even have a dream. Still, it’s good to know his contingency worked out.

***

Kon, lying bloodied and broken, covered in dust on the ground. He’s saying something, something that Tim can’t hear, but he can see Kon’s lips moving so he _knows_ he’s saying something, but he can’t tell what—

Panic wells up inside him when he sees a flash of yellow out of the corner of his eyes. He wants to call out to him, to tell Bart to move, to get out of the way, doesn’t he know it’s dangerous? But Bart can’t hear him, or maybe Tim can’t speak, he doesn’t know, he can’t, he can’t—No! No, no, Bart, _Bart_ , Bart’s lying on top of Kon now, and Tim can see his mouth open and blood pour out and he has to help but he can’t fucking _move_ —  
Tim wakes up with an almost silent gasp on his lips and wet tear tracks down his cheeks. For a second he feels stuck, the same as in the nightmare, alone and helpless, but then a warmth shifting behind him jars him out of the phantom feeling.

An arm curls around his waist, the body behind him shifting to mirror his sitting position to better wrap around him, face nosing into the back of his neck.

“What’s wrong, Timmy?” And it’s Kon, it’s _Kon_ , and he’s not dead! Of course, Tim knew that, knew it was a nightmare from the moment he opened his eyes and saw the hideous bright yellow lamp Bart had bought last week on the other end of the room, but feeling his boyfriend’s weight at his back reassures the knotted feeling in his chest.

“Just, just a nightmare, Kon. It’s alright, I’ll be fine, you should go back to sleep,” Tim murmurs, surreptitiously reaching up to wipe the stray moisture leaking out from underneath his lashes.

Before Kon can say anything in reply, though, a sleepy Bart crawls over the man to plonk himself down onto Tim’s lap. His ensuing noise of protest is drowned out when the smaller man wraps his arms around both their necks and uses the take-down Tim had shown him in training earlier that day to make them both fall back down on the bed.

“Bart, wha-“

“Bed. Time.” If Tim didn’t feel more like laughing at the man’s antics than anything else, he might even be impressed at the hold keeping him in a lying position.

“Sorry for waking you guys up,” Tim says, as Kon snakes his arm around Bart so he can hold onto both of them, guilt still clawing up his mind despite the soft smile on Kon’s face.  
“It’s okay, Tim. Seriously, “I like it when you wake me up. I always want to know if you’re okay.”

Tim hides his soft look in Bart’s floofy hair, but his boyfriend quickly moves before he can even attempt it. Instead planting a little kiss on his cheek, he murmurs, “We’re right here, Tim. We’re not leaving.”

Tim can’t make himself respond, so instead he just nods, curling his arms around the other two even tighter.

It takes a solid two minutes, but both his partners’ breathing slowly evens out. And to that gentle melody, Tim finally falls into his own peaceful slumber.

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you liked it!pls maybe even leave a kudos if you did? Or a comment, they absolutely fuel me. If u saw any formatting or spelling errors, I apologize since I didn’t get this beta read, so feel free to drop that in a comment down below too. Thanks for reading!!


End file.
